


Suspension

by LegendofMajora



Series: Unsteady [1]
Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Angst, Drunkenness, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mild Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-01
Updated: 2015-03-01
Packaged: 2018-03-15 17:33:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3455825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LegendofMajora/pseuds/LegendofMajora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is no reason why Izaya should be drinking; much less with Shizuo, in the monster's apartment. None at all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Suspension

Stone-cold dead drunk, just as usual and perfect for this. Not that Izaya necessarily cares, not preferring these sorts of things to the originality of fighting bruising kicking and or bleeding all over the place. His jacket tells of too many times it slaps against broken skin, wet with blood and stretching over the splits in his skin. Bruises look like rosaries cut and pasted into his skin scarred with knives and possibly his own to remember the feel every time he traces them. Alcohol-laden bandages only do so much, stinging and eliciting the hiss that clicks and sounds whenever a champagne bottle pops and the cork flies. All to count moments of waiting for something better, like Shizuo to come along and keep him entertained while the wounds are still healing and something feels wrong each and every time he lets himself into the abode of darkness and sweet-smelling alcohol.

He doesn't ask, plopping at the table of disgusting weary age, cleaned somewhat and still reminiscent of the crumbs of toast Shizuo probably has at breakfast for each morning, recovering from whatever hangover if monsters get them and permeate, swollen to sticky rotting brain flesh and never really alive anyway. As long as he can pull up a seat, sitting across from Shizuo and his head in his hands, thinking and breathing aloud silent save for the breaths huffing and shuffling around the fact that Izaya can let himself in at this point, they've been doing this for one two three too many months and twelve weeks turning thirteen, happy birthday again to another stupid little gathering creating enough liaison to slip in between the lines. Another excuse to get closer until it hurts to breathe when he's inches away.

Cake and ice cream to celebrate another empty birthday tonight, even though it's none of theirs. Happy little hearts for today is Valentine's Day and neither of them particularly count in the holiday for younger people even if they're still in their early twenties. Outcast and cast aside never bothering for specifics though Shizuo does rant about some stupid things while drunk and Izaya thinks it's hilarious pretending he isn't the slightest bit tipsy from the bottle of wine he sometimes receives from Shizuo, wondering how the idiot is supposed to know wine from piss water and impressed by the quality of it. Must have taken plenty of alcohol beforehand to get it right, then.

"D'you...really 'ave to keep coming back?" Shizuo grumbles a hello, slurred words maybe there maybe in Izaya's head, buzzing when the wine bottle pops and Shizuo can pour him a glass, uneasy fingers and the informant isn't sure what he's doing here in the first place but then again he really hasn't known for quite some time now. Shizuo tends to throw a wrench in his general direction and scramble any coherent thought and force him breathlessly throwing up if he makes himself ill enough with all the stupidity that starts to permeate late late too late at night. Just a little bit of screaming to tire himself when Shizuo's hands wrap around his throat but in what reality does that exist—ha, it doesn't.

Nothing does anymore. "Why of course, Shizu-chan." Why not why indeed why else is he here and why would Shizuo be drunk if he hates alcohol so much and keeps buying it. Just tip back the wine glass, already set out for himself and there's only one of its kind in this apartment and probably the entire apartment building even if wine glasses aren't normally found in Japan and come in pairs. Izaya wonders—questions—doesn't want to ask much about himself to drink worth himself and everything else that fizzles in the bottom of a wine glass. Maybe his heart fizzles there too if he has one. There is no reason he has to be here other than the entertaining thought that (once upon a time) maybe he could have—never mind.

"Then walk yours'lf out when you're done." Shizuo murmurs, head still in his hands (busy day, busy day) thinking too much about nothing while Izaya drinks the burning wine he hates to drink, despising the refined taste missing the sugar. Izaya may or may not have supplied him with moscato to make it a little better, hence the cup with a sugary pink color claiming to be strawberry wine. "Not like I can keep you out, what's the point?" Shizuo switches to one hand, eyes glazed over and distant thinking much about nothing at all, opposing the opposition of when Izaya smirks and drinks a little more. A toast for the recklessness that they'll never recall in the mornings. It's how it's supposed to be, dark little secrets tucked into neat corners hidden in draping shadows there isn't a morning for them. Nothing at all, (no more to say when he can't hear much) just taking the time for the buzzing peace between enemies sworn to kill each other. Only tonight. Just one more.

"Did you know, Shizu-chan, that today is Valentine's Day?" Izaya speaks up for the purpose of not having anything to say despising how quiet the beast is when he's around and it's not—not like him—not like anyone to still be silently humming through the night of love and other disgusting drugs. Prosthetics with anesthetic, all he thinks of in regard for such petty things. "Oh, but you already knew, didn't you. That's why you're here and not with a girl to fuck." Such crass language for a heavy purpose, weighing in the air and tipping the scales weighing in at not really caring anymore and this is routine reminders that certain things don't have a point.

Shizuo never minds in any ideal of being tipsy with alcohol, possibly drunk, possibly still coherent. His words still sting like a slap to the face that bruises because he's too strong for just a slap. Maybe break Izaya's ribs—he's done that before, enough times already would he _just_ knock it _off—_ and watch the pest bleed himself dry. That's all Shizuo does worth the attention of anyone else, in Izaya's opinion. "'f course I know that," he scowls, drinking another swallow or two, heavy and full and bobbing with his throat and the burn and the tendrils of acid that form a belch of air, disgusting. "'m the one who got chocolates t'day. 'nd the worst part is that V-Vorona, what do I..." Shizuo trails off, needing liquid courage served in a cup no judgments needed to swallow the disgust of burning trails down the inside of his throat, tongue-tied and never really the same when he first starts the habit.

Despicable, the two of them.

Izaya is capable of understanding only to the part that Shizuo trails off and isn't sure why the Vorona part matters or the chocolates he doesn't see so what's the story now if there isn't one and why does Shizuo stop? Why end the story now (like it's none of his business—it's all of his) when filling up on the part where he's supposed to mention that Vorona is only a friend and chocolates are worthless things he can eat just because he's a monster with no sensibility of being human. Not long enough, anyway, to notice the trigger words in putting the bullet into whatever gun he wants to wave around, shoot words and phrases empty and meaningless that still shatter when they hit bone. Izaya can feel the bruise over his ribs again.

(The second time this week, it's only Tuesday.)

He doesn't say much, eying Shizuo with small sips to his wine and tongue flicking to catch any drops sliding down the side of his glass. Shizuo doesn't ever look at him once and there is never a reason to catch a gaze unless if there is an appropriate reason to behave. Never in Izaya's presence does he mention anything useful. It's all for habit and sport of pretending to be human in the moments of forgetting himself with alcohol when Kasuka will never know (what would dearest brother think?) and there isn't anyone else around. And never enough alcohol to wash away whatever rotten bitter blood sticks in the bruises in between Izaya's ribs. It all pours down the same so there is no reason to be concerned for the-devilish attempts of looking for too long—devil in the details.

Izaya begins to believe the answer isn't what he wants to hear, Shizuo pondering what to say next as he recounts today's stories and Izaya listens, almost interested enough to be genuine. Whatever makes the hours pass is worth sitting, quiet moments sliding by in slicked fingers this time not with blood. "She said something, like," Izaya's not listening, eyes downcast in the same color of his eyes fizzling away, happy little bubbles dissolving anything that comes across and still the heart offer stands dangling on a thread. String, if he wants to be specific. "I dunno. Whatever she said, it was something and I can't remember, stupid flea." Lively enough to glower at said flea, not caring if Izaya doesn't return it with a grin or frown or any emotion at all, empty eyes staring into the abyss of a wine glass. Careful, don't fall too hard inside. There's no way to climb back out.

"But...I couldn't jus' say something like 'I'm not interested in you'. It had to be nice, y'know?" Shizuo scowls, remembering who he's talking to only briefly and shakes his head. "Not like you'd know anything, shitty fucking flea. Why the fuck am I even tryin' with you." Shizuo's tone falls flat on its face, fading when it bleeds out and dry to warm in the sunshine of his ugly stupid bleached hair and then forget the existence of having been said. Izaya doesn't take all the credit—most of the time—for being the root cause of all evil in Shizuo's world. Or, any world that comes within his grasp so tangible when he finally can reach it's snatched away and all Shizuo can do is pity laugh himself into a coma, because Izaya truly is a bastard who never deserves much of anything.

Sometimes he agrees more than he should. "And what did you do, Shizu-chan?" Izaya urges the conversation forward, needing a distraction from thoughts and today isn't helping at all. He doesn't care for trivial things like paper hearts cut out of stupid things like empty useless meanings in what holiday means what and who cares for having no work. Just something to take his mind off more things far beyond Shizuo's capacity and anyone else, for that matter, just drinking wine to relax and never as desperate as to get drunk like Shizuo can. Of course the blond can afford such luxuries, low-paying work does the trick with a shitty apartment.

It's not supposed to sting and buzz and ache like a hangover gone sour and Izaya really doesn't feel the need for necessities these days. Only for tonight, one more night of regretting something else or not and pretending that the burn doesn't exist after the rash of bad decisions. He wonders how Shizuo's stupidity festers in his own brain just under the influence of nothing else left to do. It's not the end of the world, but it may be the end of these little meet ups for no apparent reason much less starting and stopping to move in reverse. "I said I wasn' interested. That we could be friends, but..." Shizuo shakes his head full of blond locks and touchy sun rays stretched out baking the skin and confirming the yellow stop signs meaning slow down and prepare to end all. It's the least the warning could give and it's not a very good one if Izaya has found himself color blind. "She, she's my friend. My kouhai, I can't do that to her." Sobering his words with the shaking confession, Izaya figures he'll need more just to listen to these sob stories.

"Because you're a monster, Shizu-chan? You can't stand the thought of hurting Vorona because she means something to you, as pointless as a friendship as it is, and you can still manage to try killing me?" Izaya spits with more venom than necessary, slipping into his own drink he takes to shut himself up when this is moving out of his lips loosened by wine faster than he means to give in. All these excuses, Shizuo's eyes bright and fiery when they smolder with heat, angry and in denial when he wants to shout something at Izaya, doesn't care if it's stupid or hurtful but would rather get this over with. All the drinking and silent shouting accusations bouncing off the walls, it's not a welcoming party to Izaya, now is it?

"Shut the fuck up." Shizuo growls back, eyes slipping over Izaya and those red ones dark like rubies, stolen and tempting but dangerous and he wonders if Izaya has a lover. The eyes are hard enough to resist, lost easily in the want for taking them and keeping them in a possession but wanting to see more, more expressions and every facet there is. Raw and uncut in nights like these instead of smoothed and sanded with polish and sobriety. Shizuo prefers him like this, because neither of their brains are working to connect the dots and start the wired circuitry that comes from being together too long and not enough of actual conversation. Some things aren't worth wishing for when they drop in, offering wine and someone to rant to and simply forget it all in the morning. "Like you know anything. All you do is know how to rip people apart." Which is too true and deserves another heavy swallow of more alcohol. The bottle's half empty and filling with the same type of silence that suffocates Izaya's lungs with the things he's not meant to say.

Izaya smirks, wide and full of holes. "I know better than a monster. Why hurt another human if you can't hurt one? Selective, Shizu-chan?" And there's a right to it with being spoken and heavy in the air, everything feels upside-down and drunkenly staggering onto the side. No pain quite like the bruises staining his skin with the permanence of tattoos.

"You're not human." Shizuo growls through clenched teeth, eyes still boring into Izaya's and waiting for the answer that just won't come, stop staring if it's just too much to handle. "You're the worst kind of insect in existence." Oh, he has an interesting choice of words that chokes in Izaya's throat, swallowing more to calm the buzz in his chest. Well, it's only for tonight. One more chance to make more mistakes of all kinds until it just—ends.

"And you have the authority to claim such a thing?" Izaya murmurs, unable to keep the continual glances into his wine when it feels cold and wet slithering down his throat. His eyes and cheeks sting with alcohol and probably blood poisoning from the forms of sabotage he can count on his fingers.

Shizuo tips back the last of his cup, looking to refill the empty parts with more sugary pink fizzling alcohol. Cheap form of getting sugar and more than he bargains for, empty and waiting like the hard outside of a cup and prone to interior scoops of falling apart. Just like a cup. "More than you have, fucking flea."

"Aye. Appears so." Izaya laughs at himself, feeling drunk and alive with excitement and—heartbreak—breathy with unstable gasps of air, lightheaded whimsical dizziness. "Only for tonight then, ne? What point is there of continuing to do this if Shizu-chan isn't going to care when he's drinking if not for the same reason? You only—" he stops himself before he can choke, claiming a cough and his lungs feel like falling apart and drenched in cold.

"Oi, flea," Shizuo finally decides he's had enough of Izaya looking away, frustrated and confused as to why the pest is still permeating his stench in Shizuo's apartment with Shizuo's wine and not at all his. "What the fuck are you even doing here?" It's a sad thing he sobers up far too quickly before he can thoroughly enjoy forgetting everything of importance for just a little while. He wonders, scowling when the thought appears in his head and scrapes against the tissue of his brain, if the same applies to across the table and empty eyes, uncut and raw and the flea drunk right in front of him. A slower form of suicide, like a star-crossed lover would do and the flea doesn't even know what love is.

(Neither does he and that's even worse, being on the same level as a monster like the worm.)

"What's the point in telling you, Shizu-chan?" Pouring more wine into his cup he thinks about pouring some of it into Izaya's, deciding against wasting actually acceptable wine in the pursuit of drunken numbness. It's almost sad that he has no idea what the flea means by any double meaning of a word he says, waiting for all interpretations and getting lost in his own translations. "It's like asking why you're a monster. Because you are, and that's never going to change." Bitter and restless but his fingers are almost as steady when he tips more wine into his mouth and his eyes burn not from the stench.

Maybe he's been here for too long. "What does that have to do with anything? You trying to pull some philosophical bullshit on me again?" Shizuo snorts, another drink and Izaya looks worse for wear in trying to stitch himself back together two parts empty and three parts unable to cope with only alcohol. Doesn't notice that the realization of only one more night means holding on or letting go, painful as it is and frustrating in the evidence that he's too stupid to ever know what Izaya means. "You want philosophy? Then take it. Why the fuck are you acting like this if you know I'm gonna kill you anyway?"

Izaya's head tips forward, heart sizzling in alcohol and cradled like his head in his hands. Of course Shizuo can't guess anything but then he supposes his own intoxication has something to do with being too shallow. The beast is just too stupid to comprehend any of the things he's ever said and remembered in the early morning. "Impromptu celebration of one more night to act like an idiot, Shizu-chan. Maybe I want to act like a human before I realize it's truly hopeless for you to ever be anything else," he speaks cryptically, tongue starting to slur softly and his entire body swaying when he rests his head on his hand and stares down at the table. He's never been this chatty and quiet before, from what little Shizuo can remember.

"Tch. Why act like a human if you're not one?" he retorts, swallowing roughly over a dry patch in his mouth and a blank space in his thoughts. No point in censoring the nothing that comes out and is wasted on the stupid flea who keeps invading his head. "There's no point in pretending to be what you're not." He knows from experience and if Izaya truly is—of course he is, what is Shizuo thinking by assuming stupid things—the lowest form of a monster then the bottom must be heavy with denial, being the only one capable of being low enough to drink himself to a certain death from a monster in his den.

Another birthday wasted, a toast to celebrating the fading presence of never knowing humanity. "What can I say, Shizu-chan? A god can only love his humans by trying to understand them." Izaya doesn't touch any more wine and Shizuo manages to slide the bottle away, nearly empty while Izaya's glass is full and he's so quiet Shizuo doesn't expect the shock of having a stupid flea lying ready to be killed. Only one push to his throat and the muscles collapse, he suffocates, or snaps the spinal cord and kills Izaya in the only way of denying oxygen and a sense of resurfacing from whatever is keeping his head low and his fingers full.

"That's stupid." As if stating the obvious isn't what Izaya has been and still is here for, drinking more wine to celebrate the stupid toast over bruises and breaks that don't have doctors to fix and his mind is haywire most nights, unable to be put to rest and haunting in the early hours of the morning feeling as dead to the world as possibly achieved. All these simple realizations add up to heavy amounts of denial and feeling poisoned from Namie's own cooking except in the wrong places without any food and lightheaded for the rest of being awake until he drops. Alcohol is an easy drug to forget with. Alcohol and he doesn't know, doesn't expect the danger he is to himself and doesn't mean to care whether or not Shizuo finally kills him as if that's what he's been waiting for besides his own slow unintentional suicide of sanity. Empty and bruising and filled like a cup to the brim of everything surface and superficial, hard as bone china and pulled skin and there is still an opening where he spills over.

"I know," he chokes, and he's certain his eyes blur for more than just being drunk on the sensation of being unable to forget. The looks Shizuo passes are far too noticeable and reminding him every single time he dares—why does he keep doing this to himself, why does he bother why is he still _here—_ and aching with the stinging sort of pain that comes in both eyes and blurry vision and maybe losing his breath over wanting to spill himself over until he stops collecting all the counts of each time he does this. For him there is nothing else but the shame and satisfaction of truly knowing there is no agony quite like not being human enough to love his dear humans, all so happy and full of lives and those things called souls that light up eyes and cause pain when he ruins them. Such a happy monster life for a god, unable untouchable unreachable and neverending in the accounts of wanting to come down time to time but on a one-way ticket to the ground, splattering and scattered around every piece of the world to see what it's like to be human.

None of the drinking explains the wetness, though. He's not so much prepared for the wetness in his eyes, filling up and spilling over in the first sigh of defeat and covering it with his hands because there is no wound if he can't see it. Much less Shizuo noticing anything—he doesn't care—anyway. Not that there's anything to participate in pretending to care about or notice, wiping at his eyes and rubbing so the itching stops but the liquid produced is salty and bitter, unlike the sweet sting of wine. He has to say something, something crawling in his throat and waiting long enough to bite at his tongue and beat against his teeth so he'll bite down and refuse to let it choke itself down his throat.

"What's the point in living a life if no one loves you?" Izaya scolds himself for the bad choice of words, swallowing a larger gulp of wine and feeling the bubbles rising up his stomach and popping in the back of his throat, creating the urge of wanting to vomit up words and his lungs and every part tucked in his ribs so he can pick out the shards and the papers filed inside with every last word he breathes in and doesn't exhale. That way he can stuff them back inside, stitch up the scar and if it leaves a lasting impression then it's just too bad. "You see, Shizu-chan, people want—" _need demand scream_ _ing for_ "love. I as their god love them for being the silly, stupid humans that they are, they'll do anything for love just so they feel accepted. This way, with being loved by me, they don't have to do anything I don't ask them for."

Shizuo doesn't skip a beat. "So how's that been working for you? 'cause it'd be something if it y'know, actually fucking bothered to keep you outta my apartment." He snaps because he's sick of this and Izaya can't blame the exhaustion of trying to understand something so far beyond him at times there's the chance of altitude sickness from an everlasting high and no way certainly back down or the promise of anything being left. "Since you're still accusing me of being a monster and acting all high and mighty, I doubt that's doing anything for you since no one will ever love you back. Don't you realize how stupid you sound?" Softly slurring words of his own, swallowing the taste of sweet wine and suddenly disinterested in getting any more drunk.

Izaya's already plastered, intoxicated on his own regretful actions and everything leading him to this. "You don't understand, Shizu-chan. I have to love them because they'll never be a god. They don't see how humanity is so desirable." He doesn't want to call them tears because they're not and in his eyes they may be falling from but he doesn't see and therefore they don't exist. Just a chemical reaction. Like the strict correlation between monsters and gods that does not exist because they aren't ever the game thing and still interchangeable.

"And you will _never_ understand," Shizuo's tired of this shit, waiting on something interesting but he knows the flea to be incorrigible and still so fucking stupid it's tangible and it reeks of death and disgust. "What love is. How can you love people you torture? You think that's love, hurting them? Then you're a fucking idiot, but I bet you didn't already know that." Sobering up has never been this exhausting and not with the drunken idiot who can still incense him, anger splitting through his bones and seizing with the madness of alcohol-fueled anger. "You just prance around, spitting that you _love_ these people you murder with your own insanity. When you're just some lonely parasitic insect that won't get in his thick skull how stupid you really fucking are."

Ouch. As much as it does for making Izaya want to applaud Shizuo's lack of creativity for the insult, it still forces more wet ugly emotions to slip from his eyes, bury themselves into his shirt or his palms, coming from the melting permafrost behind his eyes heated by the fiery anger sizzling into his ears. The stupid things, emotions that monsters or gods don't have besides anger and cold calculations, not expecting the sudden melting of an ice age inside his head to create this chain reaction of being unable to breathe. He can't surface for air yet—not yet. Not when Shizuo is glaring at him, rearing to kill him and there's no reason why he shouldn't because this is all Izaya's fault for being here and for doing this, cold sticky words freezing him in place while in his throat caught with the expectation of he's going to be doing this for a while.

Whatever it takes to get this over with. "Since when did it matter about me, their god? You can't just make up things and expect me to believe you, Shizu-chan. For that matter, anyone else." No one would dare trying to talk to him anyway and there's the similarity between them again, being entirely different painfully so to the point of being exact enough to be considered monsters. Gods are a product of their creations.

"Since it—what!?" Shizuo sounds surprised but Izaya doubts it, tracing the rim of his eye and catching the slick saltwater unraveling on his fingers and down his palms, moving into the sleeves of his jacket. "It matters, because you're the one who's here, drinking yourself into trying to forget whatever it is that's keeping you here." And he'd like another drink, because it feels like a long night balancing on the bridge of his nose and cradling the back of his head with a headache. Swallowing an entire glass of wine seems like fun at first until the repercussions of belching come from the inherent stupidity of such things. Maybe it'll take longer to—understand why this is happening—realize that Izaya's shoulders are shaking, trembling like snowflakes in the first snowfall of the year.

So cautious. So tentative and his loud voice is giving him a headache and Izaya's not responding, shoulders twitching and shaking and the sound of his nose struggling for breaths, Shizuo not caring if he gets a response or not as alcohol starts to cloud his brain—not enough, never enough—to form a respectable barrier over his headache in the name of Izaya sitting across from him and inside his brain. Surprisingly he hasn't exploded and murdered the flea, but something about the unsettled ache in his shoulders stops Shizuo from getting up as he intends to do and throw the flea out onto the street.

"Iza...ya?" Shizuo swallows over himself, tongue fuzzy and swollen with alcohol and being tongue-tied with anger and swallowing it down. The sugary sweetness of the wine helps with the anger, calm him down and making it a little more manageable to talk. That's all they have to do—talk, get somewhere _say something_ already fucking flea don't sit there and—while Izaya's back shudders and his breaths sound labored, blocked and unable to get any air to his lungs. "Fuck, are you choking?" Not concerned not worried not anything but annoyed, surging up and one hand on Izaya's shoulder before he ruins everything by crashing it into the ground, alcohol already doing enough.

Izaya's head falls back with Shizuo forcing him to uncurl from himself, cheeks red and he catches the glimpse of red eyes with red whites, throaty sound escaping Izaya that doesn't sound like a smug flea when the flea pushes away from Shizuo, snarling something intelligible. Managing not much more he falls back, eyes wide and crashing to the floor with a groan that floats above him, caught in his throat and Shizuo is glued to the spot of wondering what the fuck is going on and if he's seeing things or he's being far too blind for his own good.

Or that Izaya has lived for too long in the same room he has. "What the hell, flea?" Shizuo bends over to pick Izaya up off the floor, grabbing him by the shoulder roughly but the little shit squirms and tries to escape anyway. "What the fuck are you doing?" Which isn't fair for Izaya to have to explain if it's not already obvious and alcohol never manages to get Shizuo drunk twice in one night so the headache is starting to pound, anger surging but kept behind with his heartbeat falling over itself. Izaya looks worse, feels worse than normal and tonight he's not smug from drinking with Shizuo but angry and frustrated with himself as per usual except in front of the blond beast. Nothing is making any more sense than when he struggles and Shizuo doesn't just crush him on the floor.

Instead, he finds himself held suspended with one arm extended, firmly caught in Shizuo's grasp and whines against himself and his better conscience when he struggles. The burn extends down his arm, not the same icy ache settled in his chest and still blinking saltwater from his eyes. "Listen, flea." Shizuo isn't growling even though his voice is low, rumbling in the air filled with fight or flight or die in the apartment of a monster on the floor. Whichever comes first. "You're going to explain right now, what the fuck is going on, or I'll crush you." Izaya wants to laugh, a choking noise coming up and caught in himself between the floor and saying too much, torn and the feeling of biting his tongue off in muted rage. "Nod if you understand."

He has to do it. And the moment he expects his own death his eyes are closing and far too fast he can feel himself fly off the floor, arm still caught and aching as the death grip is starting to bruise and just skimming above breaking the bones. Which makes the delusion of having an actual chance, drowned in alcohol and tired enough to call it a night and hobble back home when he meets with a wall of flesh, soft and warm and too hot when pressed against it.

"I don't even know how to do this shit." Shizuo sighs, feeling weary and ancient when Izaya stiffens against him and his arms are tightly locked around the flea, unsure of why he keeps holding onto the little shit when his brain refuses to process any thoughts for himself. "Don't—don't cry, okay? Just don't fucking cry." Izaya still squirms, heavy breaths when he inhales sharply, wet mucus catching in his sinuses and he truly is a mess of himself when nothing can come out of this. Shizuo's too hot but never enough to reach inside, pulling back from the arms and wriggling his way out, so tired so angry and just wanting to go home and forget the little display of pretending to care.

"Not crying, Shizu-chan." Izaya feels the hiccup and it trips in his breath, confirming the worst when he won't waste his time on monsters too drunk to not even slur but speak clearly, eyes hazy and he'll never remember in the morning anyway. "It doesn't matter anyway to monsters, ne? Monsters and gods will never be the same, no matter how you cut it." He laughs and it's a bitter, hollow sound that echoes deep in the gaping caverns of where he's supposed to feel smug and something like light but this and every other time it's only numb. Bared and frosted with the overexposure, tired of the lack of appeal from any sort of sunlight and the only searing heat that never scratches the surface is Shizuo's anger.

Shizuo sighs, alcohol never helping in situations like these and Izaya wants to leave now, forget this has ever happened, and never come back but it may as well be for one night. One more night to hate. Just one night to hold on for whatever—it's dead and gone. Empty, silenced, and still. When Izaya breathes Shizuo isn't looking at him, and the air is sterile unless if overturned with the corpses of words that refuse to bubble past what Izaya's teeth are clenching onto. Grinding every last thing into dust so the numb feeling starts to settle more comfortable and become bearable in some time or never.

"Why the fuck are you here, Izaya." Shizuo breathes deeply, running a hand through his bleached hair and no amount of alcohol in the world will fix whatever the flea fucking does to him. All the bug looks like is mussed with inebriation but still able to stand and his knees threaten to buckle, eyes stinging with red and his palms are wet like the front of his shirt. He looks like a mess.

Izaya steps away and the annoying part is when Shizuo steps forward, knowing the look of meaning to escape when he sees it and he's deciding that it's not tonight the flea gets to be like this. "You know, Shizu-chan. Drinking with your enemy, is all."

Liar. Shizuo can smell it on him, stepping closer and cornering the insect while he still can, having the advantage of several inches over him. "You don't keep coming back to drink with someone you hate, Izaya." At the sound of his name the flea cringes and fine, let him. Serves him right.

"No," Izaya's voice stumbles and falls on its face, much like his feet do when his knees start to give and he can't hold himself up, tiny body filled with more than enough alcohol to kill him if he drinks just one more glass. He's small enough to fit enough but never reaching the possibility of being able to be broken up and compressed into nothing. "Not really, Shi-Shizu-chan." He's stopping short of letting himself collapse, legs shaking and brain refusing to do much else besides produce more stupid saltwater from his eyes, trailing down his face.

Something stops in Shizuo, watching the clear display of having no control in Izaya to the tears on his cheeks, completely unsure as to how they got there but when they're there and wet and Izaya's frown is twisted into something ugly he doesn't stop himself. Stepping forward an arm comes around Izaya again, forcing the flea into his chest and still too drunk to even care about what he's doing. The body against his is warm and still trembling and he can't be bothered to care too much. "Well you can sit here 'nd tell me wha' the fuck your problem is," Shizuo feels Izaya's full body twitch, not allowing any room between them for Izaya to attempt escaping again. "Or you can make me answer it myself. Don' think you want that."

"It's not important, Shizu-chan." Izaya's voice is distantly urgent, frustrated as always and the colder feeling starts to kick in no matter how close he is to a source of warmth, feeling more isolated than when he first comes here to celebrate another meaningless toast to how unlucky he is. "Get off of me." Tired and angry and he doesn't want to do this, doesn't want to play this game. He wants to go home and sleep it off and take painkillers in the morning—pretend he doesn't exist for the purpose of it, just _leave_ and _let go—_ before the cycle continues. His fingers still ache where the saltwater traces and his wine glass is still full, he has to drink it because he hates wasting his favorite the monster in front of him manages to buy him for a strange occasion without invitation. He can't do this—he can't just sit here and be held up by his worst enemy and so sick of the melting behind his eyes and his brain running haywire, damaged wires with water and hissing with the threat of electronic meltdown.

It hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts—before Shizuo can breathe or blink or say anything more Izaya's head buries into the fabric of his T-shirt, breaths louder and almost inaudible when he heaves more oxygen through his mouth, trembling and shivering and it's probably never going to be from how cold he is. The entire concept of having to fall apart isn't one he's used to when he's been trying to dissolve his heart and anything so worthless as to manage stooping this low in a wine glass and watch the parts disappear, because Shizuo rejected Vorona and it's only Valentine's Day which never means anything at all.

It doesn't make sense and nothing ever does, frozen and aching and tired when the noises build in his throat, soft like whines or even whimpering. Izaya doesn't want to care, wanting to forget and pretend that this isn't happening like the hand on the back of his head, awkward and clumsy through his hair and pressed against his enemy like it's going to change anything. It's not and he knows it, this is all just a delusion of his when it hurts to consider any other possibilities when at this point Shizuo has probably already killed him and the things that are sticking to his throat are still there and bumps when he tries to breathe around them. Everything—from breaths to sticky exhales that choke and shudder—feels like thumbtacks in his lungs. Puncturing every little space they can manage and spreading blood, aching with every breath of agonizing over why he keeps doing this to himself.

He can't manage an answer, eyes not able to stay dry for tonight. As long as Shizuo doesn't say anything he's fine in suffering by himself, confused as to why the arms stay around him and a long-suffering sigh strangles its way through from another mouth, the night only beginning. Underneath his clothes the bruises from bad blood and bad decisions must be making their way through to the surface where surely he has to feel something if it settles in his chest like the entire cavern scooped out and his organs missing, empty and wasted and worthless when left a standing corpse full of numbing half-stumbled half-collected thoughts. They just don't leave no matter the vice and the time for alcohol and no matter how long he can stain Shizuo's shirt.

It's not like Shizuo to know what to say, hearing for the first and possibly last time the sound of Izaya breaking down over something so simple.

He doubts it is, spurred on from the conversation of love and still both of them drunk enough to forget this in the morning.

Just this once, then.

Maybe in the morning something will come of it.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. ꒒ ০ ⌵ ୧ ♡


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